Joe Bonamassa -Madrid, 01/10/2010: Setlist y primeras crónicas.

As promised, here I am to talk to all of you about the great night we spent yesterday in the capital of my country! Sorry for the delay but yestrday we came late back as there’s a lot of things to do in Madrid nights…you know…

First of all, talking about the venue, It was very cool to see that Joe is moving from smaller venues to bigger ones in Spain. It was some king of mix between circus and theater, a very nice place, It was not full specially as prices were a little bit high on the sides but the ground was plenty of fans waiting for the show. You could easily find young kids and older rockers mixed together waiting for the great spectacle we were about to see.

Ten minutes to midnight started to sound at 20.52 and lights were turning off so we all knew It was about to start (on time, as usual). Then Joe let some cool licks to rock on from the backstage and the crowd became to shout while Joe walked to the stage playing!

Talking about the songs we could hear. As expected, the intro was a classic, and as promised, a shocker!! Cradle rock was the chosen song to let the 2010 fall tour start!
After that we had a very nice setlist, mix of classic songs from last albums, some oldies and some new stuff (as indicated earlier by Joe, no BCC tunes). We could heard So many roads, So It’s like that, If heartaches were nickels, Never make your move to soon, When the sun goes down, Steal your heart away, I know a place, The ballad of John Henry, Woke up dreaming (with the classic acoustic solo…epic…), Sloe gin, Django, Mountain time, a couple of new songs (in the BR way, so riffy and a mid-tempo ballad so EricJohnsonized)…and I’m sure forgeting some songs, but this was the basic (mixed up, don’t remember the order between songs). Then Joe left the stage to come back later for the encore, where we were surrounded by the beautiful song from Cohen, Bird on the wire (Joe stopped after some seconds playing/singing as his capo was in a wrong fret) and Just got paid that was powerfully played and mixed in the outro solo with Led Boots from Jeff Beck (I went out of mind by then) and Dazed and confused by Led Zep…what a great closure for a great night…you would never think that this was the first gig of a new tour.

That was approximatly the setlist. For me, the best moments were the always emotives Sloe gin (thi intro in full silence was a blast) and if heartaches were nickels, and also the beatufully sung Bird on the wire…I also enjoyed to hear the bluesy tunes So its like that and Never make your move to soon and the powerful outro that was totally awesome. It was a great gig, the vocals had some problems (just because of the venue) in the first songs but It was fixed soon. I had the same impression every time I leave a JB gig, that must be the feeling that people must had in the past after seeing mytical performances of the new idolized SRV, EC, etc…It is a privilege to hear that music live.

After the show was finished, my and my friend went walking around the venue looking foe the tour truck and there It was on the backside so we had the chance to talk to Joe for a few minutes and take some photos. There was almost nobody there so Joe was very relaxed and friendly (as everytime I met him TBH, but this time there was not a “crowd” around looking for signatures and pics).

So It was a great night, very encouraging for us as guitar players (wannabes!) and amotional as music lovers. There’s not too much artists nowadays with this top-level live performances, I really let you to assist to the show if he’s some near to your city in this tour. It is well worth.

Hope you enjoy the review and the gigs to come. I’m just waiting for the next one!

Hope my english is good enough to share with you what we saw, It is sometimes difficult to express your feelings without your mother-lenguage.